Peter has already given
interviews with Chicago's NBC station; expect more interviews
from Peter and Lenny and Abe, as well as semi-literate updates
from Coldwell. Abe is apparently giving live updates from the hallway -- a fact that has been duly noted by the court -- and Lenny is repeating the news on his Facebook page. Here's a pic Peter shared yesterday:
Today's hearing may or may not be the climactic event
following years of legal paper shuffling and endless
continuances. Trudeau has alternately said he refuses to pay the
$37.6 plus million FTC fine on principle, and that he lacks the
money to pay the fine. For the past year or so he's mostly been
using the latter excuse.

I have and will continue to give all due credit to Abe Husein for
getting this story rolling in the first place by approaching Ryan
late last summer. (Peter Wink indicated to me that it was his
idea, though.) While Abe may not have been the most sympathetic
"victim," and in the eyes of many became less
sympathetic as the months went by, he was one of the loudest and
most persistent. He has declared again and again that his only
goal is to take GIN and Kevin Trudeau down. And he's willing to
do anything to achieve this goal, including an unholy alliance
with Coldwell and Wink.

At any rate, Ryan took the ball and ran with it, and he and his
investigative team went "undercover" to a GIN event in
Nashville in the fall of 2012. His first story aired in November 2012. Even Salty
Droid, who is more cynical than the average bear about
"local" news stories (and TV journalism in general) admitted it was pretty darn good.

Ryan has continued to follow the developments and did a followup story in March 2013. As the May 21 court date approached he pitched the
story to the NBC affiliate in Chicago, WMAQ, and helped them find
a local former GIN member. He also took the initiative to call Abe and arrange for a last-minute interview before Abe flew off to Chicago for his front-row seat to "Kevin's Doomsday." So, good job, Ryan.

Now the big question is: What will happen? Will Kevin Trudeau be
sentenced to prison? Will he pay his fine after all? Will there
be some settlement for a smaller amount? Will Abe get his chance
to confront Kevin "man to man," as he vowed in
yesterday's video? Will Coldwell and Peter bluster their way in
front of the cameras and try to paint themselves as heroes? (If
the latter happens, I see that backfiring in a HUGE way. Good
reporters have good instincts. Just sayin'.)

According to eyewitness accounts, Kevin has repeatedly invoked
his Fifth Amendment rights throughout this hearing. Ryan Kath's
colleague in Chicago is keeping him updated.And of course Abe and Lenny are doing their own
updates. I cannot give a blow-by-blow update myself because (1) I
am not in the courtroom; and (2) Ron and I got a flood of small
writing projects in yesterday that need to be completed ASAP. I
have to focus on the work that pays the bills, and this ain't it.
But I'll be back to update this story as needed, and to provide
links to new news stories, but I trust that Kevin Trudeau's fate
is in the hands of the judicial system -- the very system that Loony
Coldwell so loves to hate, unless it can be used to help him get
revenge (even if vicariously) for being out-scammed by someone who is much smarter, much more successful, and much more charismatic than he.

No matter what happens, today's hearing will be on
Kevin Trudeau's "permanent record," thus planting more
huge red flags for any potential scam victims who care to do a
little research. But it will also add to his martyr points, and
there will be those who continue to love and defend him, against
all reason. And if his lawyers play their cards right, they may
still succeed in making Kevin look like the poor put-upon victim
who has been bullied by the big bad government.

For now, Kevin apparently continues to plead the Fifth (or "pleat"
the Fifth, as Little Loony Coldwell put it in a recent Facebook
post), and I imagine that Loony is looking forward to
guzzling a fifth of his favorite elixir in celebration of.... well, whatever... as soon
as he can.

But I'm still thinking that this hearing is not going to end with Kevin being led away in handcuffs.

Update: I know this will come as a huge shock -- HUGE! -- but Kevin Trudeau did not go to jail today. GIN did not end today. However, the FTC apparently laid their case out very well, and since they've had more than ten years to work on it I am not surprised. Trudeau apparently has to be back in court on May 30 for another hearing, and then the judge will probably make some sort of ruling in mid-June. This may very well affect the timing of the criminal contempt trial -- a real, honest to goodness jury trial, I believe -- which had been scheduled for June 3 (more info and speculation about that here, though of course some of that post is now outdated).

Another update, 22 May: In my brief update yesterday, I originally posted a direct link to a video Abe Husein made while he was driving back to the airport to fly back to Kansas City. Since he was a witness to most of the proceedings in the court room, I felt that his video contained some actual information in between all of the boasting, self-back-patting and bragging about how Abe, "a 27-year-old kid," had created a ruckus in the court room. (I am pretty sure that Abe originally got that "27-year-old kid" theme from Peter Wink, who had his own reasons for "edifying" Abe.) But the more I thought about it the more I decided that I would rather wait until I can find other sources for information about the proceedings. So I have removed the direct link to that video. I'm not trying to "censor" Abe, merely to protect my own credibility, such as it is. You can, however, still find the video by following the "Abe Husein" link in the first paragraph of this post.

One thing I couldn't help noticing was that Abe spent a great deal of time -- both in the video and on Facebook -- taunting the attorney who was in court with Kevin, Kimball Anderson. Although whenever he mentioned Mr. Anderson's "worthlessness" in the video he added, "in my opinion" (he must have learned that from Loony Coldwell, who thinks adding "in my opinion" allows all sorts of actionable speech), Abe still may be leaving himself open for actions from Mr. Anderson. Worse, his actions in the court yesterday may have helped Trudeau's case more than hurt it. I hope not. It remains to be seen.